My apologies for last week. I had to spend almost all day training a call centre in Singapore as part of a potential new buyer's "rescue plan". They want to see if it's viable before committing more money. They paid the upfront costs for it but it was my job to train the call centre how to make sales calls. Incredibly time-consuming.

Cover Art: Kirire

Chapter 115

The "manager" carried on her day with remarkable accuracy, slotting into the role of the last without so much as a hitch in the camp's daily operations. The woman talked with campers, cooked food, repaired broken equipment and even answered her emails, logging into her account and contacting her bosses. That, they found out from Saphron.

If Blake hadn't seen the body be buried, she'd have been convinced this was the real person. She even kept to her attention-hungry personality with Blake, pestering her on how many videos she was making and when the first of them would go up online.

It got to the point that Blake started to wonder if they hadn't buried the anomaly, and if this was the real manager all along. What if the anomaly had been trying to lure her out under the guise of faking ghost activity?

"That doesn't explain why the manager went missing," Jaune said. "Also, the body was torn asunder. We saw internal organs. It's doubtful an anomaly would have such a human interior, even if the exterior were a perfect match."

The only way to know for sure was to cut her open and that might not be a possibility. Aside from being an identity stealing anomaly, this could have been a temporal anomaly – as Jaune put it, this could be the real woman from an alternate dimension, one who didn't realise she had crossed dimensions and who could slot into life here without anyone, even herself, knowing the truth.

"What's the process for that?"

"Usually, ARC Corp kills them and stages it as an accident."

"Of course they do…"

"But there has been one rare occasion where the match was perfect down to the personality and circumstances. We didn't realise they were an anomalous dimensional traveller until ten years after they arrived, and they didn't either. Father actually opted to let them live, though they're constantly monitored."

"Really? They let an anomaly live rather than kill it?"

"The argument was that the person isn't the anomaly. They're not capable of instigating dimensional travel, so they're more a victim of another anomaly that was destroyed. They're anomalous, but only in the sense of being displaced, not unlike the survivors from the bunker we left in Menagerie."

"Hm. Do I know the person?"

"No." Jaune chuckled. "They're not famous or anything. Last I heard, they were working as a head chef in a restaurant in Mistral. Though in their original world, I assume they're registered as missing."

It was an odd thought. On the one hand, the victim got transported to a new dimension but were lucky enough that it was an exact mirror of their own. They even got to be ignorant of it, and to carry on life as normal. On the other hand, the thought of losing your world and never knowing it, and never knowing your family and friends thought you dead, was rather sad. The true victims might as well be those left behind.

"We can't jump to conclusions on it being that," said Jaune. "I'm only telling you one possibility. This could be any number of things more immediately dangerous. Keep an eye on her."

"Where are you going?"

"I'm going to dig up the body again and make sure it's human." He cocked an eyebrow. "Unless you want to trade jobs?"

"No. I'm fine watching her."

"Heh. I thought you might be…"

/-/

Blake took to watching and recording at the same time, faking the videos to keep the woman off her back. Out the corner of her eye she saw the woman watching with a pleased smile, doing such an incredibly good job of acting as the woman had. If this wasn't some dimensional mischief, then the anomaly which had taken her spot was one intimately familiar with her.

Sadly, that was just as possible if it had been active here for years.

There had to be some way of proving her real or not. The fact she'd locked them in the electricity cupboard definitely hinted to the not, since the real woman probably wouldn't have done that, but was that proof enough to kill her? Probably not. Jaune had mentioned physicality, so maybe there was a way to test that.

Would the woman bleed normally if cut? Was she limited to human standards in terms of strength and speed? Again, she couldn't outright attack the woman, but what if she could stage an accident? If she could cut the woman, she could see if she had blood or something else entirely.

A text from Jaune brought her out her reverie. He'd reported a confirmation on the human cadaver, and thankfully hadn't felt the need to send pictures as proof. That was twice they'd exhumed her now and Blake felt bad for that, but hopefully the real (if this wasn't real) Kathleen would accept the indignity if it meant stopping someone pretending to be her.

Jaune returned an hour later looking glum. "That's the last time I'm digging her up," he said. "She'd already started to fall to pieces."

"TMI, thank you."

"Anything unusual with our host?"

"Nothing. Honestly, it's doing a fantastic job of filling in for her. If it wasn't for how it tried to lock us in the electrical cupboard, I'd be convinced. What do we make of that by the way? Was that a legitimate murder attempt?"

Jaune frowned. "I don't know. Locking us in there wouldn't have killed us even without weapons. We could have made a noise come morning and be let out, and chances are we'd have our scrolls on us to call for help. If it wanted us dead, that was a poor way to go about it. All it did was make us suspicious. But there's something else…"

"What?"

"When we got out, we went back to her office, and she wasn't there – neither her nor the imposter. It only appeared come morning. Why? If it was already there, why not be in her quarters where she'd be expected to reside? What was it doing that it wasn't anywhere to be found on the resort?"

Good question. An anomaly stealing her identity should have tried to stick to her routine. It was doing that now, but it hadn't during the night. It had tried to lock them up, but otherwise vanished and not been anywhere to be found until morning. "It was doing something," she realised. "It was occupied. But with what?"

"That's the million lien question."

"Another late night, then?"

"I'm afraid so." Jaune smiled. "We should sleep through the day and move around tonight. See how locked into its role it is and what it's up to. If it has to go somewhere at night to recharge, that's our chance to catch it in the act."

"Good idea but she'll get nosy if I'm not recording video."

Jaune grinned. "Then tell her you're sleeping today to make a video tonight in the dark. If she's as good at acting like Kathleen as she is, it'll see that as a good thing. In fact, go do that now. See how she – or it – reacts."

Way to throw her in at the deep end. Blake sighed but did as he said, approaching the woman, or the anomaly pretending to be her, and putting on her snooty voice. "Hey, so, we're going to crash today and start our epic video tonight," she said, flicking some hair back over her shoulder. "So, like, if you could have some food made and delivered to our lodge late on, that'd be great. Going to need a full stomach."

"Oh. Of course I can do that for you." The woman smiled. "Hoping to catch some footage of the ghost tonight?"

"If we can, sure, but if not then even some moody footage at night will be good enough for the channel."

"You found evidence the other night in that ectoplasm though."

How did she know!? Had the anomaly been watching that? Damn it, this was getting harder and harder to piece together. Was she really a displaced version of herself? Blake laughed, and decided to see if she couldn't push for a little more.

"It's good, yeah, but we get sceptics. If I show 'em just that, some freaks out there will say I faked it with superglue or something."

There! The slightest flinch masked with laughter.

Because Kathleen had almost been caught faking the evidence.

"I suppose that's the internet for you. I'll have some food left outside your door in a cooler box. It'll just be picnic food but it should be filling. Don't hesitate to use the kitchens if you want to reheat anything. I'll leave the doors open."

Thanking her, Blake power-walked back to Jaune. "She knows about the superglue." He looked confused, so she explained further. "I tested her on the superglue and she reacted, Jaune. She knows she – or the real Kathleen – used superglue to try and fake a ghost sighting."

"Really? Hah. This is looking more and more like a displaced person. How else could she know what the original did? That would imply there's an ARC Corp in that dimension as well. I dread to think what would happen if ARC Corp met ARC Corp."

Instant civil war, probably. While they could both argue they had the same goals and therefore made for immediate allies, Blake knew the desire to control what the other could and couldn't do would lead to conflict. Both sides would consider themselves the real ones and the others to be anomalous.

"Let's just get to sleep and play this night out," she said. "If she really is a displaced dimensional traveller, that just means more work for us since we need to find what displaced her."

"True. If the camp itself is anomalous…"

"Wouldn't we have heard of that before now? There's no way the whole camp is a cross-dimensional portal, and it's only just being noticed."

"It could be if the dimensions it crosses to are all mirrors of this one. If people swap places but never know, what evidence would there be? Maybe we've already swapped places with our own mirrors."

"Jaune," she growled.

He laughed. "I'm just pointing out how it's feasible. The murder a while back could have been a rare cross with a more dangerous dimension. But it's just an idea," he added. "And not a very solid one. If the switch happened, Kathleen's body should have been swapped over and it wasn't. And like you say, there should have been other incidents by now."

Good. Great, even. Blake could deal with one anomalous skin walker. The idea that the world she was in was not her own, and that everything going forward might be a lie, though? That was too much of a clusterfuck even for her.

They retired to their lodge and soon fell asleep, exhausted from the previous night's activities.

/-/

"Blake! Blake, get up!"

Jaune was shaking her. He sounded alarmed. "What…?" she mumbled, rolling over to peer out from under her blanket at him. "Whazzit?"

"You need to get up and take a look at this. Bring your camera, too. I'm a little worried we'll get in trouble if you're not in your influencer act."

Blinking away her sleepy confusion, Blake sat up and wondered why the last statement was said in such a way. Crawling out from under the sheets, she quickly changed while Jaune looked the other way, then snatched her camera. As she did, she saw outside the window of the lodge and froze.

The forest was lit up with ominous green lights.

"What the…"

It's even stranger outside. Come on.

Stepping outside, she quickly realised they weren't the only ones seeing this. A few other lodges had their people outside, pointing and talking about it. There were lights strung up in the forest, but not just the one by the lake. They were everywhere. Also, sticky patches of ectoplasm and white cloaks hanging from trees imitating ghosts.

It was very much the same as what the manager had tried before but on an industrial scale. There was too much of it, so much, in fact, that it looked even faker. Blake heard some of the neighbouring lodges asking if Halloween had come early, and others wondering if this wasn't some strange festival the manager was putting on.

"This is crazy," she whispered to Jaune. "A few lonely lights and a sighting would be more realistic than this. This is so over the top that no one would believe it."

"Hmm." Jaune grunted. "You're missing the other point."

"What?"

"How could she have pulled all this off in the hour or so it's been since people went to bed?"

Right…

They had been asleep for hours now, but everyone else would have stayed up late, which meant the manager must have done this recently. The sheer number of lights and ornaments hung around was impossible, however. It was as if every other tree had something on it, be it a cloak or a mask or a set of fairy lights wrapped around a branch. The idea she had so many of each prop was also a little ridiculous. Her office would have been stocked to the brim with fairy lights if that were the case.

"Do you think we prompted this?" she asked.

"Maybe. I think it's for us if nothing else. This could be a case of the anomaly trying to mimic the manager but getting it wrong. It must know she faked the ghost sightings, but it doesn't understand human scepticism or the concept of believable limits. All it knows is that it's meant to fake ghost sightings, so it does that – but to a ridiculous degree."

"That's—"

"Oh goodness!" Kathleen appeared from her office, a hand over her mouth. "Goodness me!" she exclaimed, doing a remarkable job of sounding and looking shocked. "What is all this!? Who did all this?"

Jaune shot Blake a concerned look.

Blake stepped up. "We were wondering the same. Is there a festival on?"

"At this time of year? No. And goodness me, am I going to be expected to clean all this up? It's going to take me days!"

Curious. Blake had expected the woman to play dumb if she were confronted on faking the ghost sightings, but this sounded just a little too real a reaction. There was genuine complaint from her, and she absolutely would be the one clearing it all up. Plus, as Jaune himself had said, it couldn't have been only her doing it. There just wasn't enough time to do so.

"This… This is vandalism!" Kathleen rasped. Her eyes sharpened on Blake. "Did you—?"

"We've been asleep all day and just woke up."

The woman wasn't convinced.

"Don't you have cameras?" Jaune prompted.

"Ah. Yes. Yes, we do. I suppose I should check those."

"Do you mind if we come?" he asked. She looked confused, but then Jaune hefted his camera. "Even if this is just petty vandalism, it'll make for a great video for Blake's channel. A mystery of the ones who snuck onto camp and set all this up while no one noticed."

"Hah? Well, I suppose it can't hurt." The woman, or the anomaly, had the same greed as the original. Any attention on the camp was good from their point of view. "I half expected this to be you trying to fake a video in all honesty."

Blake couldn't resist. "We thought it might be you trying to fake a ghost sighting."

Kathleen flinched again, but still responded convincingly. "To this degree? How could I have even gotten those lights up so high in those trees? And the forest outside as well. I couldn't have done all this. It just isn't possible!"

They all moved to the main building together, Blake having to fake an intro to a video that didn't exist and talk to the camera Jaune was holding like she was some internet sleuth. It was embarrassing but thankfully didn't last all that long. Kathleen unlocked her office and ushered them in.

Instantly, Blake's eyes flicked to where the repair kit Jaune had brought back from where Kathleen died. The superglue was still there along with the fairy lights. Incriminating, obviously, but also exonerating in the sense that she hadn't used any to cause all this.

"Let's have a look, then," she said, sitting down at the computer. They flicked back a few hours. "There's me in the kitchens," she said, around the evening time. "And I stayed there a little more to make your food and clean up. And here, you can see me entering the main foyer and going to my office."

It was true. The tired-looking woman headed straight to her room up the staircase. The camera flicked outside and went backwards again. "This is the time around when most people turned in," she continued. "If we move forward a little. Hmhm."

Jaune stopped her. "There!"

Kathleen stopped the scrolling and went back a few minutes. They all leaned in, looking at the treeline as a figure emerged. The camera was grainy but also very close, giving them a perfect view of the culprit.

The woman sat next to them.

Kathleen, the hotel manager, approached the tree and started hanging up lights.

Blake wanted to groan.

"Did you see that!?" Kathleen hissed. "The lights floating on their own!"

"What…?"

"The lights!" she said, hissing louder and rewinding back so they could see her stringing them up. "Look at that! It's like a ghostly figure is carrying them!"

Blake's eyes narrowed.

Jaune shook his head at her, then asked, "You see them floating?"

"Yes! Don't you?"

"Yes," Jaune lied, fixing Blake with a look. "Yes, we do. But this is just one tree. Try another camera."

The woman clicked over as instructed, showing a view of the front entrance.

Where she was kneeling in the grass squirting superglue into it.

"See anything?" Jaune asked, shaking his head at Blake.

"The grass there," said the woman, touching her finger to the screen. "It looks shiny."

"Is this the same time as the other camera?"

"Yes. I haven't moved the slider." To show, she flicked back to the last, showing Kathleen by a tree, and then switched back, showing Kathleen crouched by some grass. She moved on, revealing Kathleen climbing a tree, Kathleen hanging up a ghostly cape, and Kathleen falling out a tree with her arms flailing.

More and more of herself.

None of which she could apparently see – and all appearing at the same time.

"We're going to go film some video outside," Jaune told her. "Maybe you should take down this footage to serve as evidence in case your bosses raise issue. We'll be outside if you need us."

The woman nodded, too busy to notice how Blake and Jaune practically sprinted outside. This was beyond a joke now. Not one, but apparently many anomalous imposters, all of whom were acting as one and couldn't perceive of one another. "What is this?" Blake hissed.

"I don't know. Dimensional collapse? Temporal anomaly? I've an idea, though." Jaune rushed around the back of the building. "Not on what this is, but how to test it." He came to the electrical cupboard and unlocked the padlock. It was still just 1-1-1-1. Yanking it open, he stepped inside and switched off the generator, and then came back out. "Watch," he said. "Watch and wait."

It took a minute for Kathleen to come around muttering about the lack of power, head inside and switch it back on. Jaune hid when she did, motioning for Blake to talk to her. Once the woman had locked the padlock, Blake waved her over.

"Power cut?"

"Yes. It happens more often than I care to admit with these old dust generators." The woman sighed. "But it's not like we're on the grid out here."

Behind her, Jaune quietly unlocked the door and went back in and turned the generator off again. It wasn't as noticeable here, and Blake kept Kathleen occupied as he slid back outside and waited.

Sixty seconds later, Kathleen arrived muttering about the lack of power, headed inside, and switched it back on.

Jaune waved her over when she came out. "Power cut?"

"Yes. It happens more often than I care to admit with these old dust generators." The woman sighed. "But it's not like we're on the grid out here."

The two Kathleens were less than two metres from one another, acting the exact same. They both sighed, rubbed at their tired eyes, and made their excuses to get some rest. Both turned to leave at the same time.

And walked through one another on their way back to bed.

As they did, a third Kathleen came around the corner.

"What happened?" she asked. "I was trying to save the camera footage as you said, and the power went off."

"It tripped," Jaune lied. "We turned it back on for you. Save a little time."

"Ah. Thank you for that. I swear, these old generators break down all the time. But it's not like we're on the grid out here."

"So we've heard," said Jaune. "Kathleen, if we may, there's something I think you should see. It's just outside the main gate. We came across it earlier. As camp manager, you should probably be made aware of it."

Blake shot him a worried glance, but Jaune was determined. Maybe this was needed to force a confrontation. The woman seemed none the wiser and agreed to go with them, stopping only to fetch a torch from her office. They led her out the main gate past two other Kathleens, one of whom was trying to hang up lights and another of which was sweeping up fallen leaves.

At each, Jaune indicated for Blake to collect them. The Kathleens responded politely and followed when give the same reason Jaune gave the first. Soon, they were being followed by no less than ten of the woman, none of them able to perceive the others. All talking at once, echoing over one another.

They fell silent when they reached a mound of dirt and a shovel.

"I said I wouldn't do this again but here I am," Jaune said, digging it down. "I'm sorry for having to disturb you a third time."

The Kathleens watched on in shock and then horror as a body was uncovered.

And then, as one, they fell to their knees when they saw the body's face.

None spoke.

"This is you," Jaune said, speaking to them all at once. "You roamed outside, and the Grimm caught you. Kathleen is buried here, where she died. Her work at the camp is over. I'm sorry for your loss."

Slowly, each of the spectres faded away, until it was only the two of them remaining.

Jaune left the body uncovered, sticking the shovel into the dirt.

"Did she become a ghost?" asked Blake. "Ghosts are real now? And it's almost sad. The woman who spent her life faking ghost sightings to prop up a failing resort doomed to become a ghost continuing those sightings to keep propping it up."

"If only it were that easy," said Jaune. "That would imply she was the anomaly, but that would only make sense if it was the one of her. I've a feeling this isn't sorted yet."

Sure enough, their return to the camp revealed a disaster. There were versions of Kathleen everywhere – easily a hundred of them. The campers were up and afraid, huddling together and hiding in their lodges as the grounds were roamed by replicas of the dead woman, all acting independently and all carrying on their daily duties.

"It's the camp," Blake whispered. "It's not letting go of her."

"I think she imprinted on it," he replied. "Spent all her life here to the point some of her life remained with the camp when she died. It's copying her, trying to call her back in the only way it knows how."

Jaune took out his scroll and made the call.

"Associate Director, we have a situation. It's a Delta-Split scenario. Limited sentience camp is infinitely cloning its manager in a ghostlike form."

"Understood. I'll dispatch Terra to destroy the camp and the surrounding area. Anything else?"

"We'll need a task force to deal with witnesses. We have at least thirty people who are here right now and exposed to this. They'll need addressing to and convincing to be silent. There's nothing we could do to suppress it."

"A team will be dispatched. Hold the fort until arrival and prevent any of them leaving. We'll have our best come up with a convincing cover story. For now, you're to keep the people as calm as possible until extraction."

/-/

It was only two hours later that numerous Bullheads landed and men in uniforms spilled out. They regarded the many copies of Kathleen warily, but collected the civilians and ushered them on board the shuttles. Jaune had assured her none would be harmed, and ARC Corp wouldn't dare use a mind-altering anomaly.

Most would be bribed, threatened, and forced into silence.

Whatever worked.

Terra came with her rifle slung over her shoulder. "Looks like you had fun here," she said, watching as a Kathleen walked on by. "Non-threatening for now, eh? I wonder if that'll change once I take aim on the place."

It might. If the camp was sentient, it might try and defend itself. Right now, the Kathleens were going about their routines, up to and including turning on the power every time someone turned it off. They were like machines following their programming, except that the programming was daily routine from the woman who had lived here.

"You know, the bosses of this place wanted to keep it open," Terra said. "Told us that a camp with endless free labour could revolutionise the economy."

Blake cursed. "Bastards. She's a dead woman enslaved against her will."

Terra shrugged. "That's what we would have said but… well… they threatened to expose us if we didn't let them keep her."

"Expose ARC Corp?"

"Yes."

Blake dared to ask. "What will happen to them?"

"Saphron is dealing with them personally."

"I expect they'll need a new Board of Directors," Jaune said. "But it's what they get for trying to use anomalies. We made that mistake before."

"Indeed, we did."

It didn't take long for the last of the people to be shipped out. Blake and Jaune climbed onto the Bullhead with Terra, who took out her odd little snow globe showing the universe and began to shake it. The stars and moons span by in the blink of an eye, until Terra found and selected a tightly glowing star. With a slip of her finger, she drew it out and slid it into the rifle, then brought the scope up to her eye.

Below, every Kathleen looked up at once.

"Rest in peace," said Terra, pulling the trigger.

The camp went up in fire.

Next Chapter: 16th September

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